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I'm still conflicted about this. I understand the cost and blood diamond debate and largely agree. But there is something about diamonds that makes them divine:

I'm still conflicted about this. I understand the cost and blood diamond debate and largely agree. But there is something about diamonds that makes them divine: carbon atoms crystallizing and bonding over millions to billions of years to form structures, rated on a scale of color, clarity, cut, and weight. It's like gold, primarily forged in cosmic events like supernova explosions. Naaaaah let's just make it in a lab it looks the same. People are being priced out of art and beauty and it's a shame economics and corruption make real diamonds dirty.

chasil 1y ago
Unfortunately, De Beers controls the natural diamond supply, and they leave much to be desired in corporate ethics. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Beers#Legal_issues https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Beers#Legal_issues
- jxntb73 1y ago
  And the US holds 50-70% of the total world market capitalization, and yet here we are. Believe 15A and 19A as much as you can believe De Beers' 'Building Forever 2030 Goal's
K0balt 1y ago
It’s not just that, the economics of diamonds is completely fabricated. Idk about these days, but debeers used to buy up the vast majority of mined diamond, not to sell but to hoard or destroy them to maintain scarcity. I’m not even sure that all of these recent stories about lab created diamonds to come out aren’t actually a PR pitch to advertise “natural” diamonds, an effort to emphasise the difference in the public psyche. Anything public facing that positions diamonds as expensive, desirable, or valuable can usually be traced back to the cartel. It’s super common in movies and other media.
- jxntb73 1y ago
  I'm not excusing nor rationalizing prices and the economics, obviously they hoard and manupulate the rates. Can't argue with how dark that crap must be. All I'm saying is real diamonds are 'better' and everyone knows it. Humans are emotional and that's a good thing. The manipulation of it is the bad thing. Trying to deny yourself of your emotions like a monk and yet still wishing for the iconic symbolic significance having 3month salary storybook ring, what are we doing here. Pay more for the real thing because life is real.
  - cmsj 1y ago
    I wear a £20 titanium wedding ring from Amazon. The symbolic significance is what we imbue in it, not what it itself is.
    - K0balt 1y ago
      100percent on board. A marriage is only as meaningful as the vows and the integrity of the people that made them. The guests are there to witness and to celebrate. Trying to make it about anything else only cheapens it. If you can, put enough gold on her to get her out of a jam and have some runway. Other than that it’s just the promises you keep.
    - kergonath 1y ago
      Titanium is cool, nothing wrong with it. It’s not as shiny as the noble metals but it’s just as interesting.
    - pimeys 1y ago
      We did not even get anything. For what is a ring even meant to be? To mark your partner, that he is yours?
      - K0balt 1y ago
        No, that’s what the subcutaneous tracking chip is for. lol. But seriously, for us it matters, since she is much younger than I am. We make an effort to signal that we are a committed couple so that people don’t make crass assumptions. Still, my ring is tungsten carbide and hers is a family wedding band handed down in my family for generations. Our engagement ring was also a family heirloom. In that way the rings have meaning. She likes to wear her ring because she feels like it is a symbol of belonging, and I wear mine to honor our relationship. To us, the rings are symbolic of our vows, a gentle reminder that our lives are in service of one another.
      - nicoburns 1y ago
        It can also be a reminder of that person, when they are not physically present. Similar to keeping a photograph of a loved one in your wallet.
probably_wrong 1y ago
I'm all in for finding beauty in our daily lives, but I'm not sure diamonds are more special than other things we take for granted. Oil and helium have also taken millions of years to form, and yet no one spends a second before buying a plastic duck or inflating a balloon. And if the point is that diamonds are shiny and pretty (which is a fair reason for liking them) there are other types of stones around just as good.
dumbmrblah 1y ago
I’m curious, how old are you? Age range works. The article emphasizes that this is a generational thing and I’m wondering which generation you fall into.
- jxntb73 1y ago
  The article emphasizes financial pressures on new couples due to rising living costs making lab-grown diamonds more appealing, and that's sad in my mind, it's sad that the cost of living prices people out from nice things, it's sad that people here are coping saying lab made are the same, which to me is like saying a veggie patty is the same as a beef and I'm a bad person for eating meat, that a knockoff purse is the same as the brand name because they are both leather; dematerialize and dissasociate from the world more why dont you, oh are you above consumerism and so romantic you could wear a string as a wedding band because its more about meaning. What's the point of any fashion then. Of any art if any paint will do. Gold is just metal too then. [Born during Clinton's first term]
  - 9rx 1y ago
    > it's sad that the cost of living prices people out from nice things Cost of living can only go up if people are willing to pay more. People are paying more for what we deem living expenses because what they consider "nice" has changed. In the past people would spend more on a diamond and less on a house because they were out and about all day and wanted others to see the diamond. Now, they stay home to scroll through TikTok (or post on HN), so they would rather spend more on a house instead. If diamonds, or something like it, became more interesting to people again, they'll soon start turning their sending in that direction — away from where they are currently directing it.
    - jxntb73 1y ago
      > Cost of living can only go up if people are willing to pay more. , is the worst economic take i've heard in a while and I read the FT. CoL is primarily driven by supply and demand, not willingness to pay, not to mention inflation, supply chain issues, inelastcity... Fake diamonds are for vegans.
bloqs 1y ago
there are many naturally occuring objects that have a similarly dramatic timeline the point is that westerners are completely drunk on the marketing from de beers and its cost lives, not to mention the disgusting machiavellian exploitation of what was once an innocent courtship gesture into an aggressive commercial enterprise, chiefly profiteering the hopelessly young and naive.
kergonath 1y ago
> But there is something about diamonds that makes them divine: carbon atoms crystallizing and bonding over millions to billions of years to form structures It does not take millions of years to form a diamond. It takes hours. The million years are atoms sitting around doing nothing before that, and then diamonds sitting around doing nothing while some of them are eventually pushed to the surface. You can say the same thing about any mineral. There is nothing special about carbon or the diamond structure. If anything, zircons are much more significant, being the oldest minerals we can find. > rated on a scale of color, clarity, cut, and weight. This is nothing special. The colour of lab-grown stones can be varied almost at will, and the rest is still an issue with synthetic stones. > Naaaaah let's just make it in a lab it looks the same. That’s the thing, though: it does (yes, some synthetic stones have specific defects related to how they were made and they tent to be too perfect if anything, but they still have the exact same property). It’s like complaining that the meat you are eating comes from a farm instead of being hunted. > People are being priced out of art and beauty and it's a shame economics and corruption make real diamonds dirty. Quite the contrary. Gemstones become more accessible to more people. The diamond industry made its bed, being completely corrupted from extraction to distribution. When stones are cheap we can have discussion about their beauty instead of their prices.
Ekaros 1y ago
If the value is in perfection. Why would I not pick one that is bigger, has less flaws and less impurities. It is like would I prefer natural rain water or artificially purified water without microplastics and pfas and so on... My pick should be clear.
- MITboy12 1y ago
  "When you buy a natural diamond, you're also buying a risk of cancer and various diseases, because all natural diamonds contain trace amounts of thorium and uranium. This is due to the fact that diamond crystallization occurs deep within the Earth's mantle, where these radioactive elements are naturally present

chasil 1y ago

Unfortunately, De Beers controls the natural diamond supply, and they leave much to be desired in corporate ethics. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Beers#Legal_issues https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Beers#Legal_issues

jxntb73 1y ago
And the US holds 50-70% of the total world market capitalization, and yet here we are. Believe 15A and 19A as much as you can believe De Beers' 'Building Forever 2030 Goal's

K0balt 1y ago

It’s not just that, the economics of diamonds is completely fabricated. Idk about these days, but debeers used to buy up the vast majority of mined diamond, not to sell but to hoard or destroy them to maintain scarcity. I’m not even sure that all of these recent stories about lab created diamonds to come out aren’t actually a PR pitch to advertise “natural” diamonds, an effort to emphasise the difference in the public psyche. Anything public facing that positions diamonds as expensive, desirable, or valuable can usually be traced back to the cartel. It’s super common in movies and other media.

jxntb73 1y ago
I'm not excusing nor rationalizing prices and the economics, obviously they hoard and manupulate the rates. Can't argue with how dark that crap must be. All I'm saying is real diamonds are 'better' and everyone knows it. Humans are emotional and that's a good thing. The manipulation of it is the bad thing. Trying to deny yourself of your emotions like a monk and yet still wishing for the iconic symbolic significance having 3month salary storybook ring, what are we doing here. Pay more for the real thing because life is real.
- cmsj 1y ago
  I wear a £20 titanium wedding ring from Amazon. The symbolic significance is what we imbue in it, not what it itself is.
  - K0balt 1y ago
    100percent on board. A marriage is only as meaningful as the vows and the integrity of the people that made them. The guests are there to witness and to celebrate. Trying to make it about anything else only cheapens it. If you can, put enough gold on her to get her out of a jam and have some runway. Other than that it’s just the promises you keep.
  - kergonath 1y ago
    Titanium is cool, nothing wrong with it. It’s not as shiny as the noble metals but it’s just as interesting.
  - pimeys 1y ago
    We did not even get anything. For what is a ring even meant to be? To mark your partner, that he is yours?
    - K0balt 1y ago
      No, that’s what the subcutaneous tracking chip is for. lol. But seriously, for us it matters, since she is much younger than I am. We make an effort to signal that we are a committed couple so that people don’t make crass assumptions. Still, my ring is tungsten carbide and hers is a family wedding band handed down in my family for generations. Our engagement ring was also a family heirloom. In that way the rings have meaning. She likes to wear her ring because she feels like it is a symbol of belonging, and I wear mine to honor our relationship. To us, the rings are symbolic of our vows, a gentle reminder that our lives are in service of one another.
    - nicoburns 1y ago
      It can also be a reminder of that person, when they are not physically present. Similar to keeping a photograph of a loved one in your wallet.

probably_wrong 1y ago

I'm all in for finding beauty in our daily lives, but I'm not sure diamonds are more special than other things we take for granted. Oil and helium have also taken millions of years to form, and yet no one spends a second before buying a plastic duck or inflating a balloon. And if the point is that diamonds are shiny and pretty (which is a fair reason for liking them) there are other types of stones around just as good.

dumbmrblah 1y ago

I’m curious, how old are you? Age range works. The article emphasizes that this is a generational thing and I’m wondering which generation you fall into.

jxntb73 1y ago
The article emphasizes financial pressures on new couples due to rising living costs making lab-grown diamonds more appealing, and that's sad in my mind, it's sad that the cost of living prices people out from nice things, it's sad that people here are coping saying lab made are the same, which to me is like saying a veggie patty is the same as a beef and I'm a bad person for eating meat, that a knockoff purse is the same as the brand name because they are both leather; dematerialize and dissasociate from the world more why dont you, oh are you above consumerism and so romantic you could wear a string as a wedding band because its more about meaning. What's the point of any fashion then. Of any art if any paint will do. Gold is just metal too then. [Born during Clinton's first term]
- 9rx 1y ago
  > it's sad that the cost of living prices people out from nice things Cost of living can only go up if people are willing to pay more. People are paying more for what we deem living expenses because what they consider "nice" has changed. In the past people would spend more on a diamond and less on a house because they were out and about all day and wanted others to see the diamond. Now, they stay home to scroll through TikTok (or post on HN), so they would rather spend more on a house instead. If diamonds, or something like it, became more interesting to people again, they'll soon start turning their sending in that direction — away from where they are currently directing it.
  - jxntb73 1y ago
    > Cost of living can only go up if people are willing to pay more. , is the worst economic take i've heard in a while and I read the FT. CoL is primarily driven by supply and demand, not willingness to pay, not to mention inflation, supply chain issues, inelastcity... Fake diamonds are for vegans.

bloqs 1y ago

there are many naturally occuring objects that have a similarly dramatic timeline the point is that westerners are completely drunk on the marketing from de beers and its cost lives, not to mention the disgusting machiavellian exploitation of what was once an innocent courtship gesture into an aggressive commercial enterprise, chiefly profiteering the hopelessly young and naive.

kergonath 1y ago

> But there is something about diamonds that makes them divine: carbon atoms crystallizing and bonding over millions to billions of years to form structures It does not take millions of years to form a diamond. It takes hours. The million years are atoms sitting around doing nothing before that, and then diamonds sitting around doing nothing while some of them are eventually pushed to the surface. You can say the same thing about any mineral. There is nothing special about carbon or the diamond structure. If anything, zircons are much more significant, being the oldest minerals we can find. > rated on a scale of color, clarity, cut, and weight. This is nothing special. The colour of lab-grown stones can be varied almost at will, and the rest is still an issue with synthetic stones. > Naaaaah let's just make it in a lab it looks the same. That’s the thing, though: it does (yes, some synthetic stones have specific defects related to how they were made and they tent to be too perfect if anything, but they still have the exact same property). It’s like complaining that the meat you are eating comes from a farm instead of being hunted. > People are being priced out of art and beauty and it's a shame economics and corruption make real diamonds dirty. Quite the contrary. Gemstones become more accessible to more people. The diamond industry made its bed, being completely corrupted from extraction to distribution. When stones are cheap we can have discussion about their beauty instead of their prices.

Ekaros 1y ago

If the value is in perfection. Why would I not pick one that is bigger, has less flaws and less impurities. It is like would I prefer natural rain water or artificially purified water without microplastics and pfas and so on... My pick should be clear.

MITboy12 1y ago
"When you buy a natural diamond, you're also buying a risk of cancer and various diseases, because all natural diamonds contain trace amounts of thorium and uranium. This is due to the fact that diamond crystallization occurs deep within the Earth's mantle, where these radioactive elements are naturally present